#whether or not we actually do get more Kathony than we think

[thedisdainfullysilentvisitor]

Anthony could've never married Edwina, you know why? He wouldn't have ever wanted an entire years' worth of a honeymoon alone with her.

[easybrainrot34]

🖼️Lil Benedict Bridgerton Headcanons Pt 2🖼️

Woohoo part 2 baby!! Part 1 is right here! Some of these are modern!AU some of these are Regency era. As I said before I am truly a ✨slut✨ for this man. Hope y’all enjoy 😊

All r fluff and crack. Bonus Polin Headcanon ❤️

🎨= modern!AU

🎻= Renaissance era

🎨🎻= either

Also mentioned : Colin, Anthony, Kathony, Queer!Eloise, Gregory, and Polin

Ps, my ask and request r open :)

🎨 He went on a gap year before college to travel the world. He went kinda everywhere but he’s not one of those people that’s pretentious and has to talk about it all the time (no shade Colin, he’s more of an excited puppy about where he’s been anyway)

🎨 During cov!d he really honed in on his skills as an artist but also got really into skincare and hair care. Now he does a whole curly hair care routine because even though I can see him keeping his hair on the shorter side, he still likes it to have a little body.

🎨🎻 He would never admit it to Anthony (at least sober) but he wants the love that Kate and Anthony have for each other. He is such a hopeless romantic and I think he wants nothing more in this world than to find someone he feels he truly can’t live without.

🎻 Now we all know Benedict goes to balls more out of family obligation than actually wanting to, but I truly feel like once he’s married, he wants you to throw balls every season. He loves being able to show you off and what better setting them a ball with you as the person of honor. I also feel like he would enjoy throwing balls/parties for his more artistic, not part of the ton friends.

🎨 Now let’s say this is a modern AU where Eloise is a lesbian and our dear Ben is bisexual. I feel like when Eloise came out to him and said “I’m gay” he said, with no hesitation “you too?” I feel like the next day this man would just barge into her place with a gift bag full of Girl in Red, Chappell Roan, and Raneé Rapp albums, a pride flag, and a Carabiner. She would give him the “these are all stereotypes” lecture, but truly she appreciates it.

🎨🎻 I feel like he is very weak willed when it comes to his nieces and nephews. Like he is the favorite uncle, yes it took him bribing the kiddos, and yes he has no shame about it. He would stay firm with them (respecting the majority of set rules) but he will let them get away with small things. It will take him having his own kiddos to understand where everyone is coming from. (trust & believe that the siblings take their revenge)

🎨 He’s weak for a sundress. Weather it’s a cute little flower print, or a simple solid color, he just loves a little flowy sundress. I can’t explain it. It’s just this man’s weakness. (Btw this is what I mean when I say sundress, because apparently the Internet is having a debate about this right now lol)

🎻 Y’all remember when people were painting on each other’s bodies during Covid? Yeah he would do that. I feel like he would very much use u as a canvas during yall’s honeymoon. I feel like it would also end in a little ✨spicy time✨

🎨 While I can really see this man not giving a fck about whether he is fit or not I feel like as he starts to get a little bit older (late 30s early 40s) he would sign up for the gym. I feel like this will be a combination of him wanting to, but also Anthony, Colin, and Gregory would tease him about getting a “dad bod”. He knows though that you love it so he wouldn’t try to get too fit, just enough to be a little toned.

🎨🎻BONUS🎻🎨

He has such a fondness for Pen. This man is in her corner, if her and Colin get into a fight he automatically is taking her side. If he sees Cressida doing some shady sh!t he’s calling her out right then and there. I also feel once Colin and Pen announce their engagement, he would go to her and say “I’m sorry it took him so long to realize what we all knew” AHHH I JUST KNOW HE SHIPS POLIN!!!

[mermaidsirennikita]

I had the same thought about LW exposing Anthony and Kate and that being their impetus to marry. While we know the bee sting will happen, I kind of suspect it might be kept on the DL initially. Penelope will know somehow, though, and misreport it since it looks scandalous but was actually innocuous. Therefore thwarting the Anthony/Edwina engagement or wedding…

But LW reporting of an “affair” would be horribly humiliating for Edwina, fuck up their sisterly relationship, and have awful ramifications on the Sharmas reputations, which are already fragile. Yet I’m sure the show would spin it as Penelope being a well-intentioned/righteous “Kathony shipper” who wants to rescue Edwina from a loveless marriage, or some BS.

If so, it establishes a pattern of Penelope targeting more desirable WOC. And I do think we’ll see LW at her most vicious S2 - “hitting her lowest point” - and they’ll begin to redeem her the following season. But Penelope’s such a miserable, bitter person, I’m not sure how anyone can be expected to root for her as a heroine regardless.

To me, there seems to be a few schools of thought on Penelope. I think that if you've bought the sale with Penelope to the point that you dismiss her doing anything wrong, there's nothing she can do that will flip your opinion on her. It seems like a lot of these people project onto Penelope, to be quite frank--they're either so attached to book!Pen (who is a totally different character) that they pretend that show!Pen is like book!Pen... Just because it's like a "my Penelope, right or wrong"... Or, they project onto her for themselves. I see a lot of people say that they relate to Penelope because she's a wallflower, because she's fat, etc. I personally can't relate to being a wallflower--I think a lot of that really comes down to personality more than anything else--but I can relate to being bigger, and I just don't see myself in Penelope at all. I've said this before, but I find it... offensive... That she is the way a fat woman with a romance arc on mainstream TV (so hard to find!) is being portrayed. She's jealous, vindictive, and so insecure about her appearance that it's cliche. I just want a fat girl whose arc (especially her romance arc) doesn't involve negative feelings about her appearance for once.

Then, there's the school of thought wherein people want to like show!Penelope because they like book!Penelope, but the ice is getting thinner. If Pen does go after the Sharma sisters, I see that ice breaking a bit more. A lot of people love Kate. And I think that because Marina wasn't a main heroine and wasn't so beloved, people dismissed what happened to her (not... something I love). It's harder to dismiss it when your favorite is the one being targeted.

Then there's the school of thought that I belong to, where they've basically botched the character to the point that there's no getting her back. I've honestly yet to find a person who watches this show in my "real life" who likes Penelope. Everyone pretty much hated her.

I think that as much as they will try to frame it as Penelope being on the side of good IF she exposes Kate and Anthony (forcing Kate and Anthony to be together, "saving" Edwina from a loveless marriage)... There's a lot of bad going on with that. You're taking the choice away from all of them, for one thing--even if they were going to make dumb choices. And you're exposing Edwina and Kate to the world ~caprice and derision~ to paraphrase 2005!Pride and Prejudice. While also potentially fucking up their relationship as sisters.

And whether they play it as Penelope being jealous of attractive women of color, the fact that this was already a thing in s1 just makes it feel that way again. Like, damn girl. What's your damage with these women? Cressida Cowper has gotten less damage from Lady Whistledown, ffs.

[deadmunds-ghostbee]

WOT are your thoughts/predictions for mary? i love her sm as she already is in the book, and she’s one of the best parental figures in the series, but given what they’ve hinted on as her backstory for the show, i’m kinda curious if she’ll have an arc of her own 👀

Ahh hi I’m so glad we have this Mary Sharma safe space to discuss her 😌💜

I think given the fact that even Newton has an arc, if she doesn’t have something it would be nothing short of an atrocity that I would waste no time gathering a mob to storm Netflix HQ for.

I have so many thoughts.

aanyway RANT BELOW ⬇️😄

We know Lady D is taking a strong interest in supervising kathony + Edwina activities. And since we didn’t see Mary at the ascot (from pap pics) it is interesting because last season the moms play that huge part of guiding their girls through the market. Without her being there it spurs a couple of thoughts:

Namely, how soon has it been since her husband died? How much is she still grieving? What is her relationship with society? She must have loved the man to run away from her life, but did she really hate the constraints of society? Or was okay at navigating and dealing with it?

The biggest question mark about her is why would she lead her daughters back in an environment she ran away from? The most obvious reason is necessity bc of lack of wealth, but surely Edwina could find just as good as good of a match with just as much money from where they came from? How soon has her father, the earl died (if all that stuff they edited out of her bio still rings true) and how fraught was that relationship?

I’ve also seen people mention that she might have a sister in the ton with a daughter but this cast of characters is so large idek how they’d handle all that 😆

Since it’s been years since the scandal how much of the ton will remember her/it? Is it an impediment on Edwina finding a match? She went to that ball so clearly she shows up to society events so she isn’t trying to hide but I can see her being nervous about it given the circumstances.

So I would say my best guess about her is

1. Grief (a HUGE recurring theme this season I’d think bc Kathony and deadmund and the fact that pens dad just died) hopefully she has her moments with Kate and Edwina about this. More on this later.

2. How SHE feels about this proposed “head over heart” dichotomy since she seemed to follow her heart and is now dealing with the consequences. Charitha mentions pressure to marry well or be perfect—where does that come from? Both Edwina and Kate seem dead set on her getting a love match, which I assume they want bc of the good relationship between Mary and their father. I would characterize her as being encouraging for them to find love but it presents an interesting repeating of history for her.

ALSO since there’s been a lot of talk of Edwina’s powerful storyline, whether Edwina goes gay or is involved with a man (Theo sharpe watch ur fuckin back I stg) it would probably very closely parallel what Mary has already gone through, abandoning what’s conventional to have what she wants. So maybe her and Edwina relationship will be really big in later episodes while Kathony are fucking!!

Now these are both very vague things. A lot of internal conflict and not much to do since it seems Lady D and QC are taking such a large interest in the Sharmas on the market. Of course she’ll be there for it, but I think there’s something else they could mine for her.

In my rants I’ve often wondered how/where Violet plays into all of this? It seems like her and Daph are gonna have a sit down and be like okay Daphne will take care of Anthony (a good choice actually bc I don’t think Vi and A could actually manage this with their relationship at the moment.) and Violet will take Eloise.

But what is Eloise really like on the market when it seems that she will mostly be playing mystery with LW and maybe (?) wrapped up in some activism thing?? That’s such a downgrade than Violets role last season imo.

The connection here I think is that a loss of Edmund and Mary with her husband will really connect them. And Violet will be old enough to remember a scandal if it happened. So maybe I’m clowning a bit but I’d like to see a relationship forged between them! But that also goes for the other older women too! The main thing that really ties all these different matriarchs in the ton is their relationship with grief, losing their husbands, and taking their own initiative. Portia will have to basically fend for herself and the girls (🤪🤪🤪) and deal with that loss. The queens is losing her husband even tho she’s literally in front of him and she’s compensating by using people as playthings. Lady D has been great on her own for a while it seems, but she once lost people she loved too and built herself back up. I think it would be a FLAGRANT oversight if they didn’t consider these connections in some way. Especially since the older women are the backbone of this show. The rest of the cast varies a lot talent-wise and the show would fall apart without them.

So for Mary’s arc is still very blurry to me but taking all of this I expect it to be very involved with her scandal, Edwina, and something with the other mothers. Also kate too ofc but that relationship im seeing less to really develop there.

This answer was probably way too long/analytical and I may be clowning a bit as a Mary stan, but I have faith that the writers won’t just discard her. The other older women had too much to do s1 to completely let Mary fly by the wayside when all this material is here.

Thanks so much for the ask!! I’d been wondering the same thing myself and writing it down crystallized it for me! Fuck I love themes and arcs 😩

[deadmunds-ghostbee]

I also do not want Edwina with a white guy. It would be nice to see an interracial relationship on the show w/o a white person. I know Edwina eventually has a match of her own, but I would like if she isn’t married this season, and they leave it a little open ended. They haven’t talked much about Edwina being bookish and nerdy like the book, and I hope that’s still in tact. I kind of want her to be a bluestocking, living on Anthony’s dime at the end.

I’m also trying to keep the faith for gay Edwina. It would be too perfect. Charithra seems to speak in hyperbole a lot, so who knows. But imo that’s the only storyline that would justify talks of Edwina having supposedly the biggest character arc.

Agree with all you said anon!

It seems likely at this point that Edwina will have a love interest, but a special and unexpected friend *could* still be just a friend? I think for me, Edwina's arc is so important because it will be a new and central part to the main plot. Like I'll welcome the deviations (you know what im talking about) from the book as long as they make her story worth those deviations. Running off with a conventionally attractive woke straight white boy character (even if he's poor or whatever (side note-is pen paying him a lot? How does he feel abt her dragging ppl in a gossip column? is that his way of fighting the rich lol?)) may be a risk in-universe, but through the modern lens which production boasts, it's optics are just really underwhelming?

Like think about it. If this powerful arc about an immigrant girl navigating her autonomy and dealing with expectations of being a perfect wife ends with her running off with someone like that, what really is the modern viewer's takeaway? (Don't mean to use Charithras words against her if this is actually what ends up happening. she's excited about a character who she's connected to and is right to hype her! this is just my thoughts on the writers room).

But because of all of this maybe I'm a little optimistic about where they can take her? I've just been assuming the absolute worst (and I'm aware the cynicism is showing).

It's very possible after a Kathony marriage (whether Edwina is pissed abt it or not) that suitors won't want to be with her anymore because of gossip or they think something's wrong with her. Maybe the queen or LW will publicly roast her lol? Maybe in this place where she feels useless because she can't make a marriage which she thought was the only thing she was ever good for, she "falls in love" with some other person and ruins herself in the process? Maybe someone else ruins her? And she has to pull herself from the bad cycle and take a good look at herself.

All this aside I actually do have a smaller hope for her. I really want to see her hang out with Eloise and Penelope. Their little nerd squad will be so fucking messy when they're meant to be the smart ones. I hope there is time for something like this but I do expect most of her airtime to be with Kathony. At least up through episode 6.

My many paragraphs aside: I am determined to love her even if her arc sucks! I'll give her my own happy ending if I think she deserves more than what she gets.

This is Edwina Nation and we are Edwina strong and anyone who says a bad word abt the baby girl is gonna have to throw hands

[deadmunds-ghostbee]

I actually really liked the shot of Lady Whistledown at the end, with it moving into Penelope - I think people are going a bit far with all these conspiracies about Nicola now, we’ve still got 6 weeks, let’s complain once it’s out 😂

Anyway I have a theory! I think there was something in the teaser or something else where they talked about Whistledown being more powerful than the queen - and in the teaser you see the Queen smiling as Anthony takes out Edwina to dance.

So - I think the queen is going to be pushing Edwina together with Anthony, but LW is going to do something that causes Kate & Anthony to have to marry? OR she just pushes them as a couple and causes tension with everyone (maybe because Pen sees what is really happening with that dreaded triangle). It says something about Edwina being the Queen’s pawn and maybe she is using her to prove she calls the shots on the marriage mart, and Edwina gets caught up in it and has to stand up to the queen in the end.

I don’t really want this to be true? But kind of feel like Lady Whistledown may have a part in the K & A love story.

No I definitely agree that QC is meddling to prove her power. Lady D said in the graham norton clip after all that SHE picks the diamond, so QC will play that to her advantage. She wants scandal to maybe lure LW out of shadows or pin her down but she also wants the power of being in charge. In the zoom event someone said LD and QC have a lot more scenes together—maybe they’re both involved. I do think LD will see the Kathony bond tho and whether QC is aware too it’ll be interesting to see how this all plays out? How she utilizes the triangle to her benefit, whether she actually wants Edwina/Anthony to marry or intends for Edwina to be hurt by the outcome—who knows.

I don’t have too many issues with the story line. as with anything, it depends on execution. But I think it’s inevitable they’re all (and Lw) are involved in some way or another with kathony drama. As long as we get a clear focus on romance and we get all our Kathony centric scenes I’m happy.